Nicholas Wall and Amber Masters Middle/High School Content Literacy Team Teaching Lesson Plan Learner Profile/Contextual

Factors: This lesson is taught at Chetek-Weyerhauser High School in Chetek, WI. There are 23 students in this class. The total enrollment for Chetek-Weyerhauser High School is 295 students in 2012-13. There are 74 students in 10th grade. The distribution of students with disabilities are 83.7% without disability, 3.7% other primary disability, 9.2% specific learning disability, 1.4% emotional behavior disability, 1.7% cognitive disability, and 0.3% speech or language impairment. This lesson is taught in a high school advanced biology classroom, and is an elective class for sophomore level students. This lesson is part of the unit of the history of biological diversity, and is taught at the beginning of the unit. Three students are HPL or high performance learners. Goal(s): The student will understand Charles Darwins theory of evolution. The student will also understand the evidence that supports evolutionary theories and how evolution has progressed throughout history. Common Core Standards: B.12.1 Show how cultures and individuals have contributed to the development of major ideas in the earth and space, life and environmental, and physical sciences. B.12.3 Relate the major themes of science to human progress in understanding science and the world. B.12.5 Explain how science is based on assumptions about the natural world and themes that describe the natural world. Objectives Content objective: TSW watch a short movie clip concerning the theory of evolution. TSW define Charles Darwins theory of natural selection. TSW also read the introduction to On The Origin Of Species by Charles Darwin, and discuss as a group with each student giving his or her personal perspective on what he or she reads, as well as offering their own definition of evolution. Time Frame: 20 minutes Resources/Materials: Movie clip of Ice Age, projector, copies of the introduction of On The Origin Of Species, paper People: Media specialist in case of technical difficulties, HPL specialist Instructional Procedure We will begin class by having the students fill out an entrance slip of writing down their definition of evolution. After they have all taken a seat and filled out their entrance slip, Dr. Wall will walk around to ensure all students have filled out their slip (they are to keep their slip for this class), and Ms. Masters will begin the video clip. This will take approximately 3 minutes. When the video has ended, Ms. Masters will introduce Charles Darwin and his theories of selection and how they led to ideas of evolution. This will take approximately 2 minutes. Following this short lecture, the students will be divided into groups and Dr. Wall will pass out the Introduction to On The Origin Of Species for each student. The individual students will be instructed to read their selected sections and discuss it with their group. They will be instructed to write down their conclusions, personal thoughts, and opinions on their Introduction paper. This will take approximately 8 minutes.

After the groups have finished writing down their conclusions, each group will share their ideas and what they learned with the rest of the class, as well as what they think about Darwin and his theories and how they might have been received when the book was first published. This will take approximately 5 minutes. Their introduction papers and conclusions will be theirs to keep to help study for their unit exam at the end of the unit. Following the group sharing, each group will then be asked to re-define evolution on their exit ticket, and if anything has changed with their definition. This exit ticket is to be handed in to Dr. Wall and Ms. Masters before they leave the class. The three high performance learners in the class will also be asked to read the entire introduction to On The Origin Of Species themselves and write a short, one page reflection of what they thought of the introduction itself, and what they imagine was going through Charles Darwins mind while he was writing this. This assignment will be due on Friday at the end of the day, and is designed to help introduce critical thinking by thinking outside the box about what introducing a radical idea to the world of science must have been like. This assignment is to offer a greater challenge for the HPL students compared to their classmates when learning about this topic. Assessment: Each student will fill out an entrance slip with their definition of evolution, as well as re-defining evolution at the end of the class activity to monitor their learning progress. This will be an informal assessment. At the end of the entire unit, they will be formally assessed with a unit exam covering this and other chapters on The History Of Biological Diversity. Entrance question: How would you define evolution? Exit question: How would you define evolution and has anything changed with your definition?